New young-adult area finds home in library’s hallowed Great Hall

Friday

Jan 11, 2008 at 2:00 AM

By Margaret Carroll-Bergman I&M Staff Writer

For many years, teenagers looking for a book to read at the Atheneum wandered the stacks along the narrow corridor between the main library and the children’s wing, where the books for teens were shelved. With no room of their own, teens had one Windsor chair to sit on. Adolescents stood propped up against a wall or sat on the floor, while dreamily thumbing through a book.

This never-world for teens is about to change as the new Young Adult section of the library will open on Saturday, Jan. 12 in the west wing of the recently-repainted Great Hall.

Children’s librarian Maggie Head and members of the Atheneum’s Teen Advisory Board have been meeting for the past year to designate a space in the Great Hall for young adults.

“Teenagers need a place to hang out,” said Wyatt Leske, a member of the advisory board. “The Weezie library is a great place for kids, but teenagers need their own space.” Before the library’s 1996 renovation, which reopened the second-floor Great Hall for lectures and research, the second-floor space was opened just once a week in the summer for tours.

When the Atheneum was rebuilt in 1846 after the Great Fire, which destroyed most of downtown, the library was the cultural center of the island. Writers and intellectuals of the day, including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Horace Greeley, Lucretia Mott, Frederick Douglass and Maria Mitchell addressed audiences in the Great Hall as lectures were a popular form of entertainment.

After the library’s 1996 renovation, the Great Hall was reopened to the public. A computer lab and library tables were installed. The local history collection and rare books, which had been stored in the Great Hall, became easily accessible to the public. The stage which hosted many of the greatest thinkers of the 19th century was once again hosting writers, including Nathaniel Philbrick, Calvin Trillin, John Kerry and Teresa Heinz Kerry, Stephen E. Ambrose, Lisa Norling, Henry Louis Gates Jr. and David McCullough.

“The Great Hall is a very beautiful space,” said Leske, a senior at Nantucket High School. “It has a very nice atmosphere.”

“We have a growing high school, the teen population on Nantucket is growing,” he added. “The library is a great institution. I hope it’ll be the way it always was.”

The new Young Adult section will carry nonfiction and fantasy books, a DVD movie collection and magazines geared toward adolescents. The space will also be renovated to include study carrels, comfortable chairs for reading and a study table.

“The idea of a young-adult reader is not a new, but attention to this group, 12- to 18-year-olds, has increased over the past 10 years,” said Head. “We are hoping to increase young adult use with this new space and increased programming.”

“The category is not for reading level, but more for different content appropriate for teen readers,” added Head. “In the new space, we will have a young adult staff member available on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons until 8 p.m. and on Saturdays.”

High school junior Lizzy Skokan works at the library as a page in the children’s section and also serves on the Teen Advisory Board. This is her third winter working in the children’s room.

“The children’s section has so many younger books,” said Skokan. “Right now, we have a small hallway. The Great Hall has so much space.”

Although the high school has a library, Skokan noted the differences between the Atheneum and the high school facility.

Photo by Nicole Harnishfeger

Leske takes a look through some of the reading material in the newly designation young adult section of the Great Hall at the Nantucket Atheneum.

“It’s not as structured as the school library, which is geared toward research. I enjoy reading in the town library. I think the new space will bring kids in.”

So far, three teen “Open Mic” nights have been planned, but the advisory board is also looking to offer poetry slams, workshops in comic art and other events.

“I’ve enjoyed working with the teens’ energy and fresh ideas,” said Head. “If we want them to be engaged in services for their age group, they definitely need to be involved in the process.”

The young-adult section will open at 7 p.m. Saturday, Jan.. 12, with a performance by the Chuck Colley Trio in the Great Hall, 1 India St. A reception will take place following the concert at 8:30 p.m. Members of the public are invited to view the newly-renovated space, learn more about services for young adults and enjoy refreshments.

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